We somehow made it out the front door without making too much noise, although I would have bet money that Cassie and Sam were standing behind their bedroom door, waiting for us to pass so they could go down and get breakfast started.
Outside, the world lay cold and white around us, the large magnolia in the front yard now wearing a glossy crown of snow. No footprints marred the pristine whiteness, like a blank page waiting to be written on. The borders between sidewalk and drive and lawn no longer existed, the snow offering paths waiting to be discovered.
“Come on,” I said, grabbing his hand. “Let me show you the gazebo. And then we can come in the front door and pretend that you met me outside in the snow.”
Despite not having the right snow wear, we barely seemed to feel the cold as we trudged to the backyard. The gazebo slept under a blanket of snow that had erased the steps, but only a dusting lay inside on the benches. Colin surprised me by scooping me up and carrying me over the steps, then joining me.
“Your nose is all red,” he said, and kissed it.
“So is yours,” I said, laughing. “I’m beginning to understand what you said about making happy memories of snow. I’m not hating it quite so much right now.”
“Then I suppose we’ll just need to practice more.”
I turned around in his arms, looking past the snowcapped railing and the acres of white to the forest that bordered the rear of the property. “About ten years ago, someone wanted to tear down the woods and build a neighborhood there, but my daddy saved it. I’m glad. It’s part of Walton and this house, and I can’t imagine one without the other.”
“I can see why. Do you remember what you told me once? Something your aunt said about home.”
I smiled, surprised that he’d remembered. “Home is a place that lives in one’s heart, waiting with open arms to be rediscovered.” I shrugged. “I couldn’t wait to leave, and I can’t imagine myself living here again, but it’s nice to know that it’s here to come back to. You said that once, when we were at Hovenden Hall. You said it’s where all your childhood memories lived, good and bad.”
The sun struggled to peer through the clouds as the wind picked up, blowing tufts of snow off the roof of the gazebo. He kissed the back of my head. “Do you like the beach?”
“I love the beach. Before Mama got sick, we’d take family vacations down to the Florida Panhandle every summer. It’s my happy place.”
“Good,” he said, turning me around so that we faced each other. “Because I’ve bought a bit of property in Bournemouth. It’s not far from London, so a nice place to escape the city from time to time. I’d like to build the house Eva and Graham dreamed about.”
The heat of unshed tears brushed my eyes. “That would be . . . remarkable.”
I could almost hear Precious agreeing that such a thing would be a fitting monument for a formidable woman. “She would love that. And so would Graham.”
I thought of Precious, who’d taught me so much. Grief is like a ghost. She’d been right about that. But she’d learned to live with her ghosts, bringing them with her in each of her incarnations like trophies showing where she’d been. What she’d overcome. What she’d loved and lost. But also what she’d survived.
Colin’s eyes held a strange light, and I wondered if it was simply the winter sky and the reflection of snow. “I thought Nana would like to have her story end there.”
We kissed again as another gust of wind blew the powdery snow along the surface of the lawn, sparkling in the weak sun like lightning bugs. Then he took my hand and led me back to the house, where Suzy and Sam Junior were leaping off the front porch and shouting as only children playing in a rare snow could.
“We’ll come back in summer so you can catch lightning bugs. I’ll have Aunt Cassie make you your own jar with your name on it.”
“I can’t wait,” he said, even sounding like he meant it.
The front door opened, and Cassie appeared with two mugs. “Hurry up and get out of your wet things, you two. Your breakfast is getting cold. I’ve made hot cocoa to warm your hands.”
I shared a glance with Colin as we both smiled at our private joke. We left our wet shoes and dripping coats on the porch, then followed Cassie inside the house.
Home is a place that lives in one’s heart, waiting with open arms to be rediscovered.
I hurried after my aunt, eager to share something I wanted to add.
And sometimes home is where one finds it, in the heart of another person who will always believe you are worthy of love.
I turned to see Colin, his eyes serious, as if he’d heard me say the words out loud. As if he, too, was remembering a formidable woman who’d shown us how bravery and reinvention could open up a life and enrich it with possibilities.
He smiled as he followed me into the foyer, closing the door of the old house behind him.
AUTHOR’S NOTE
I lived in London, England, in a beautiful Edwardian building near Regent’s Park, for seven years while growing up. I remember being dumbfounded when our doorman told us that some of the windows in our building had been shattered during the Blitz. For the first time in my life, I felt the presence of the past, something immediate and present and not relegated to dusty history books. I never forgot it, and our flat transformed from a place to live to a piece of history I could touch and experience firsthand.
When I became a writer, I knew I would one day return to London, using it and my building as a setting for a future novel. This book is the
